"Going to run away?" asked Tom, with interest, and suddenly dropping his malicious look.
"I know I am innocent of any crime; and I know that the Lord will not let me stay here a great while."
"What do you mean to do, Bob?"
Bobby made no reply; he felt that he had had more confidence in Tom than he deserved, and he determined to keep his own counsel in future. He had a purpose in view. His innocence gave him courage; and perhaps he did not feel that sense of necessity for submission to the laws of the land which age and experience give. He prayed earnestly for deliverance from the place in which he was confined. He felt that he did not deserve to be there; and though it was a very comfortable place, and the boys fared as well as he wished to fare, still it seemed to him like a prison. He was unjustly detained; and he not only prayed to be delivered, but he resolved to work out his own deliverance at the first opportunity.
Knowing that whatever he had would be taken from him, he resolved by some means to keep possession of the twenty dollars he had about him. He had always kept his money in a secret place in his jacket to guard against accident, and the officers who had searched him had not discovered it. But now his clothes would be changed. He thought of these things before his arrival; so, when he reached the entrance, and got out of the wagon, to open the gate, by order of the officer, he slipped his twenty dollars into a hole in the wall.
It so happened that there was not a suit of clothes in the store room of the institution which would fit him; and he was permitted to wear his own dress till another should be made. After his name and description had been entered, and the superintendent had read him a lecture upon his future duties, he was permitted to join the other boys, who were at work on the farm. He was sent with half a dozen others to pick up stones in a neighboring field. No officer was with them, and Bobby was struck with the apparent freedom of the institution, and he so expressed himself to his companions.
"Not so much freedom as you think for," said one, in reply.
"I should think the fellows would clear out."
"Not so easy a matter. There is a standing reward of five dollars to any one who brings back a runaway."
"They must catch him first."